by T. T. Flynn
Kilgore spoke earnestly: “Connie, I’ll make up the horses. Any way I can, I’ll make it right.”
“I know you will, Matthew.”
Gid Markham broke in with hard bitterness: “More to this than horses! He’s got his man, Travis, now. We had a first warning about Travis, and I knew it, when Travis bailed him out of that bank note. They’re hiring men. Making plans. Give ’em an inch and they’ll crowd us now.”
Matt Kilgore said: “Connie, that ain’t all I came for. It’s time to live in peace. If there’s promises I can make that will hold peace, I’ll make ’em to you. If there can’t be friendship, we can live quiet, at least. Time for it all to end.”
An angry sweep of Gid Markham’s hand gestured all of it away. His mother looked at him. “Gideon, what has Matthew Kilgore ever done to you?”
“All my life . . .”
Her low voice said: “All your life Amos Markham filled you with dislike and hate of Matthew Kilgore.”
“He knew . . .”
“Enough, Gideon,” she said quietly. “It is over.” She looked up at Matt Kilgore. “You know, Matthew, that when Amos died, the law gave me most of the property. This is my ranch now. This is my house. Will you come in and rest before you start back? And your young friend, of course.”
“Ma’am, I thank you,” said Clay. His ghost of a smile was for her eyes. “But I’ve got to get back to Soledad.”
The creases in Matt Kilgore’s leathery face were deepening in a broad smile. Consuela Markham smiled faintly back at him.
The smallest pulse, Clay noted, beat faster in her neck. She looked younger. Matt Kilgore looked younger, too, with the smile lighting his face under the shock of gray hair as he lightly dismounted. Clay had the feeling that Gid Markham, and all the crew and himself, had passed completely from Kilgore’s thoughts. The two of them walked to the portal together. Matt Kilgore said something that made her laugh as she looked up at him.
Slowly Clay gathered the reins and eyed the mixed feelings on Gid Markham’s face.
“Now that’s real reason,” Clay said, and swung his horse and left.
XVIII
This was fear such as Patricia Kilgore had never known, nightmarish because of her desperate uncertainty. In the quiet of the big house, through the dragging afternoon hours, the feeling at times approached terror. Through the kitchen windows she watched the wagons pulling out, one by one, each wagon heavily loaded under masking tarps, pulled by four horses, heading obviously into rough country. Riders accompanied each wagon. Some were laughing, talking. Others were silent, as if grim expectancy had dropped upon them.
Each time Roger walked to the house, Patricia retreated to her bedroom. Late in the afternoon, Roger came to her closed bedroom door. His voice was touched with impatience.
“Anything wrong, Pat?”
“A headache.”
“Can I open the door?”
“It’s bolted,” said Patricia steadily. “I’ll come to the kitchen.”
In the kitchen, she found Roger wearing a plain canvas jacket, jeans, gun belt, like one of the crew. He was big, hard, confident as his critical look surveyed her.
“You look pale, Pat.”
Her smile felt like a stiff grimace. “Where are the wagons going, Roger?”
“I’m starting some fencing.” His cool assurance held authority as if he owned the ranch now. “I’ll be gone for a day or so,” Roger said. “Matt can look for me over by the Ojo Rojo Spring.”
“Does Dad know you’re starting all this?”
“I decided it was time,” Roger said carelessly.
Patricia forced her steady glance on Roger’s long, bold face and hair shading to the reddish side. “I’m worried about Matt riding over to the Markhams with that man, Mara.”
“I tried to stop Matt. He would be bull-headed,” Roger said without concern. The new authority was strong in Roger. Obviously Matt’s movements or wishes did not greatly matter now.
Patricia thought of the warranty deed she had so lightly, recklessly signed. Half the ranch now belonged to Roger. He bulked big and confident in the quiet kitchen, forceful impatience strong on his long-boned face. Like a stranger now. Patricia clenched hands when Roger stepped close and kissed her. She held the smile as he walked to the door, spurs chinking, and lifted his hand as he went out.
What has happened to us? Panic, fright increased. And Matt—what of Matt?
* * * * *
Some time after dark, Matt returned, whistling in unmistakable cheerfulness as he off-saddled at the corrals. Through the open kitchen door, Patricia listened incredulously to that light-hearted, keening whistle. She had hot coffee and warm food on the table when Matt walked in, grinning broadly.
“Everything’s going to be all right now,” said Matt right off. “Connie Markham an’ me settled it all.”
“What about Gid Markham?”
Matt stopped at the table, caught up the mug of coffee, swallowed deeply, and grinned across the mug. “Connie owns most of that ranch now. What Connie says is what’s done.”
“Is that man Mara at their ranch?” Patricia inquired with tight care.
“He rode on to Soledad.” Matt chuckled as he sat down, his hat pushed back and tilted a little. “Mara wasn’t one of Gid’s men. He an’ his partner helped old Ira Bell out with a hoss herd for a few days, which is how he got pulled into this.”
Under her breath, Patricia said: “Two of them. Partners. Where are they from?”
Matt broke open a biscuit and started to butter it. “Drifters, I reckon.” His grin came again. “That Mara is all man. I take to him.”
Patricia turned to the stove and aimlessly moved the heavy iron skillet. “Roger has taken the wagons out. You can find him around the Ojo Rojo Spring.”
“Why’d he do that today?” Matt sounded irritated.
“Roger just decided.”
“Wasn’t no use of such a rush.” Then the good nature that Matt had brought back from the Markham Ranch took over. “I’ll ride out tomorrow an’ take charge,” Matt decided.
Patricia’s throat tightened as she gazed at Matt’s creased and smiling face. Tonight he looked younger; he looked happy. The knot of fear tightened. All Patricia could say was: “Maybe that’s best.”
Matt had a wry thought. “I left Mara’s pipe in the drawer over there. First one goes to town can leave it at the doctor’s house.”
“I’ll take it,” said Patricia.
Matt was squinting past the lamp. “Say, you look kinda peaked and tired.”
“I’ve had a headache.”
It satisfied Matt as it had Roger. He left the kitchen, whistling again under his breath. Patricia gazed after him, marveling at the magic that Consuela Markham had worked.
Amos Markham was dead. Matt was a lonely man. A fantastic thought parted Patricia’s lips. Consuela Markham was still young-looking, really lovely. Matt was still a catch. Patricia’s wry smile came at the thought of Consuela Markham in the family. Then Patricia sat at the table and the fear came starkly at her again. When she finally went to her bedroom, she knew what she must do tomorrow.
* * * * *
Clay slept in Soledad at the Boston House. In the morning he ate again in Ah Wing’s, and thought of the man who had wrapped himself in the life of Roger Travis. A clever fellow, completely ruthless, Clay knew now, who would kill to hold what he had.
Clay was watchful when he left the hotel and walked to Mrs. Strance’s house. She opened the door when he knocked. Sleeves were rolled back on her slender arms. Stove heat flushed her smooth cheeks.
“Yes, Mister Mara?”
Hat in hand, Clay gave her an estimating look. “Ma’am, you visited the Kilgore Ranch yesterday.”
“Do you object?” Her bright hair, piled higher this morning, not pinned so severely, gave her face a new softness.
“Depends on why you went and what you said, ma’am.”
Her eyes measured him. “You mean it depends on what I sa
id about you.”
“I mean,” Clay said, “exactly that.”
“Do you still refuse to answer my questions about San Francisco?”
“Some prying women mean well,” Clay said, “some don’t. Both kinds make trouble. I need to know what you said about me at the Kilgores’ yesterday.”
“Is it so important?” When he nodded, she said: “I told Patricia that you’d come to me about your sorrel horse.”
“That all?”
“Yes.”
“If you’re a friend of the Kilgores, let it stay that way,” Clay said. “Don’t talk about me.”
Calmly now, Dorothy Strance said: “Why not?”
“Because,” said Clay, “you won’t know what you’re talking about. A gabbling young lady can put her foot in her pretty mouth and be sorry.”
Color deepened in her heat-flushed cheeks. Quiet temper entered her measured words. “Yesterday, Mister Mara, I suspected you were a dangerous man. Now I’m certain of it.” Her glance surveyed the lithe slackness of his tall figure. “Consuela Markham thinks you are Matt Kilgore’s friend. I don’t think so.”
“Yesterday you went to the Markham Ranch also and gabbled about me,” Clay guessed.
Coolly Dorothy Strance said: “I go where I please. And after this, come to the Beacon office, not my home.”
Clay’s faint smile weighed her as he turned away. “Ought to wear your hair like that more often,” he advised. “Looks pretty.”
He had no way of knowing that the young Widow Strance stood inside her closed door, smiling ruefully to herself before she shook her head in the way of a woman puzzled and exasperated.
* * * * *
Dr. Halvord’s buggy was waiting in front of the doctor’s house, ready for a round of calls. But in his small parlor, Paul Halvord’s craggy face smiled about Howie Quist and Ira Bell.
“No reason why they shouldn’t move to the hotel now,” Halvord said readily. “Quist should be careful for several days.”
“How about Ira Bell?” Clay asked.
“Some of these old-timers,” said Halvord, “seem to be able to take anything. Bell has had his rest. He’s ready to start another trip, although as his doctor I’d suggest more rest.”
“Would some easy riding hurt the old man?”
“Do him good, I believe,” said Halvord. His sobering glance studied Clay. “Gid Markham and his men stopped in town yesterday on their way back to the ranch. Trouble with the Kilgores seems probable.”
“Matt Kilgore rode over to the Markham Ranch yesterday afternoon. All settled.”
After a moment, Halvord said quietly: “I’m glad.”
Twenty minutes later Howie Quist, Clay, and Ira Bell stopped at Ah Wing’s before they went on to the hotel. Howie wanted a steak. They sat at a back table, and Clay told of his visit to the Kilgore Ranch and ride to the Markham Ranch. Ira Bell asked an odd question.
“You say Matt Kilgore an’ Connie Markham was smilin’ when they walked in her house together?” And, when Clay nodded, the old man grinned.
“Does it mean anything?” demanded Clay narrowly. “I need to know everything now.”
Ira Bell poked his fork at the steak he had ordered. His faded eyes took on a back-reaching look. “No young feller ever hit the Valley of the Río Grande like Matt Kilgore did fresh outta the Army.” The memories made Ira Bell cackle under his breath. “Matt was like fire loose in tall grass. When he give them black-eyed señoritas his big, laughin’ howdee-do, they flustered like a buck rooster had hit the pullet roost.”
Clay asked: “Was Missus Markham there?”
“She was the proudest, purtiest gal in all the upper an’ lower river settlements,” said Ira Bell. “Only then she was Consuela Rivera. New Mexico never seen the like of them two together.” Ira Bell sank his knife into the thick steak and grinned again at his memories.
“Don’t hold back on us,” said Howie in exasperation. “You got ’em together now.”
Again Ira cackled under his breath. “They was together with winder bars an’ distance atween ’em. Lookin’ at each other ’crost the street they was together. If Matt hadn’t made a trip to Santa Fe, Connie Rivera’d been Miss Pat Kilgore’s mama . . . an’ a fine mama, too.”
Clay remembered the gray-haired man yesterday, watching the slender woman in black walk toward him. “Kilgore went to Santa Fe and met another girl?”
“A man can’t he’p what hits him. Matt fetched a wife back from Santa Fe.”
Clay’s soft whistle came. “Rough on the girl waiting for him.”
“Connie understood. Right off, quick, she married Matt’s best friend. Matt an’ his new wife was at Connie’s weddin’, an’ the laughin’est one there was Connie.”
“What started the feud between Amos Markham and Matt?”
“Ain’t outsider’s business.”
“I mean no harm, old man. But it may help me.”
“I ain’t fergot I owe you,” Bell said. He brooded. “Amos was a Bible man, give to right earnest prayin’. Made him unforgivin’ to them as didn’t see his way. Ain’t it plain Amos knowed he got second choice from Connie, an’ it worked on him till he give Connie thirty year of sad misery?”
Howie forked a bite of steak and snorted. “Picking jealous on his wife thirty year.”
Ira Bell shrugged, and Clay sensed they had not heard all the story. “Do people know this?” Clay asked.
“Most is dead that might ’a’ guessed it. Connie never let on about her misery. She’d made her trade an’ stayed proud. Folks never saw much of her.”
“I see,” said Clay slowly, and he saw many things.
Thirty years with Amos Markham, never complaining, Clay thought. But she never forgot Matt Kilgore. Yesterday they were together again. Then his own hard, uncompromising business moved in. Casually Clay said to Ira Bell: “Like to ride out with me a few days? You know the country.”
“I owe you,” said Bell readily.
Later, while Bell went on to the hotel, Clay and Howie walked slowly around the plaza. Howie’s broad face, shaved now, was showing a trace of healthy color as his tremendous vitality asserted itself.
“Travis has dug in here,” said Clay thoughtfully. “He owns half the Kilgore Ranch already. He’s going to marry Patricia Kilgore. And he’s like a son now to Matt Kilgore.”
“Hell of a son,” muttered Howie.
“Protects him,” Clay said. “The Kilgores and all their friends will believe him and back him. We know he’s a liar and a thief. And I think he’s moved like a thief and liar with honest people, so that he’s on loose ground.”
“How come?” Howie said alertly.
“He had a Socorro lawyer at the ranch,” Clay mused. “He let that horse thief Doyle go free. Piles of fence posts are cut and ready, and this isn’t fence country. Empty wagons are waiting. A large, tough crew is ready for some sort of trouble.”
Frowning, Howie asked: “What kinda trouble?”
“I don’t know,” Clay admitted. “But I can’t see big trouble breaking without Gid Markham being pulled into it. And trouble with Gid Markham is something Matt Kilgore doesn’t want now.”
“Where does this get us?” said Howie skeptically.
“Travis is top man with the Kilgores and hard to get at now, short of shooting him,” said Clay with slow thought. “But a liar and a thief can hang himself among honest people. If Matt Kilgore ever turns against him, he’d better watch out. I’m going to scout around and see what’s about to happen.”
“You sure Travis don’t suspicion you?”
“Reasonably certain. But the young widow at the newspaper suspects something. She’s dangerous.”
“Ain’t all women?” Howie was increasingly disturbed. “I oughta go with you.”
“Not until the doctor says so,” Clay flatly refused.
“Then old Bell can name a spot where I can find you two in a few days,” insisted Howie stubbornly. “I ain’t meaning to shank-sit here in town whi
le Travis picks you off.”
Clay grinned. “He won’t, but come along when you can. Travis is cornered now. Only thing is how best to get him.”
XIX
Patricia’s fear this same morning was greater because she dared not share her improbable belief. She watched her father leave for the Ojo Rojo Spring, and Matt’s hat had the jaunty tilt of last night. He was whistling light-heartedly.
For a moment Patricia felt gratitude for the new zest for living that Matt obviously had gotten from Consuela Markham. Then, as she slowly reentered the house, the fear came at her again until it was close to panic. It drove her into Roger’s deserted bedroom with tight-lipped purpose. On the wall, Dick’s photograph, young and smiling and forever gone, watched her hurried search of the room.
Among other things, Patricia found a journal wrapped in oiled silk. She carried the packet to her room and, tensely on the edge of her bed, read the closely written pages. It was a devastating experience. Written in the journal were all the events which Roger had ever spoken of—but Roger’s words had been stilted and unreal, Patricia realized now. From the pages she turned slowly came alive a man who never could have been Roger. This man was a surging, vital stranger, light-hearted, humorous. His great hopes and his soaring happiness stirred deep emotions. And the final agony of his grief and lonely despair far north in Wyoming wrenched at Patricia. Her eyes were damp when she carried the journal back to Roger’s room and, for an aching, lonely moment, gazed at Dick’s smiling face on the wall. And then, quickly in the midmorning, Patricia started a hasty, determined ride to Soledad.
When she reached the busy Soledad plaza, she sighted the man named Howie Quist, lolling on a bench in the yard of the Boston House. Quist saw her reining up at the hotel tie rail and came forward. They met at the edge of the sparse yard grass.
Patricia remembered how this big man had sprawled in a gray-faced daze on the sorrel horse. Today, washed and barbered, Quist’s broad face had a milder look. His interest was wary as Patricia bluntly inquired: “Is Mister Mara in the hotel?”
